Lamb The Gospel According to Biff Christs Childho - By Christopher Moore Page 0,58

I was almost sad when they finally, after ten days on our trail, decided to attack.

Ahmad, who was usually at the front of the caravan, fell back and rode beside us. "The bandits will ambush us inside that pass just ahead," he said.

The road snaked into a canyon with steep slopes on either side topped by rows of huge boulders and wind-eroded towers. "They're hiding in those boulders on top of either ridge," Ahmad said. "Don't stare, you'll give us away."

Joshua said, "If you know that they're going to attack, why not pull up and defend ourselves?"

"They will attack one way or another anyway. Better an ambush we know about than one we don't. And they don't know we know."

I noticed the squat guards with the mustaches take short bows from pouches behind their saddles, and as subtly as a man might brush a cobweb from his eyelash, they strung the bows. If you'd been watching them from a distance you'd have hardly seen them move.

"What do you want us to do?" I asked Ahmad.

"Try not to get killed. Especially you, Joshua. Balthasar will be very angry indeed if I show up with you dead."

"Wait," said Joshua, "Balthasar knows we are coming?"

"Why, yes," laughed Ahmad. "He told me to look for you. What, you think I help every pair of runts that wander into the market at Antioch?"

"Runts?" I had momentarily forgotten about the ambush.

"How long ago did he tell you to look for us?"

"I don't know, right after he first left Antioch for Kabul, maybe ten years ago. It doesn't matter now, I have to get back to Kanuni, bandits scare her."

"Let them get a good look at her," I said. "We'll see who scares who."

"Don't look at the ridges," Ahmad said as he rode away.

The bandits came down the sides of the canyon like a synchronized avalanche, driving their camels to the edge of balance, pushing a river of rocks and sand before them. There were twenty-five, maybe thirty of them, all dressed in black, half of them on camels waving swords or clubs, the other half on foot with long spears for gutting a camel rider.

When they were committed to the charge, all of them sliding down the hillsides, the guards broke our caravan in the middle, leaving an empty spot in the road where the bandits' charge would culminate. Their momentum was so great that the bandits were unable to change direction. Three of their camels went down trying to pull back.

Our guards moved into two groups, three in the front with the long lances, the bowmen just behind them. When the bowmen were set they let arrows fly into the bandits, and as each fell he took two or three of his cohorts down with him, until in seconds the charge had turned into an actual avalanche of rolling stones and men and camels. The camels bellowed and we could hear bones snapping and men screaming as they rolled into a bloody mass on the Silk Road. As each man rose and tried to charge our guards an arrow would drop him in his tracks. One bandit came up mounted on a camel and rode toward the back of the caravan, where the three lancers drove him from his mount in a spray of blood. Every movement in the canyon was met with an arrow. One bandit with a broken leg tried to crawl back up the canyon wall, and an arrow in the back of his skull cut him down.

I heard a wailing behind me and before I could turn Joshua rode by me at full gallop, passing the bowmen and the lancers at our side of the caravan, bound for the mass of dead and dying bandits. He slung himself off his camel's back and was running around the bodies like a madman, waving his arms and screaming until I could hear the rasp as his throat went raw.

"Stop this! Stop this!"

One bandit moved, trying to get to his feet, and our bowmen drew back to cut him down. Joshua threw his body on top of the bandit and pushed him back to the ground. I heard Ahmad give the command to hold.

A cloud of dust floated out of the canyon on the gentle desert breeze. A camel with a broken leg bellowed and an arrow in the eye put the animal to rest. Ahmad snatched a lance out of one of the guard's hands and rode to where Joshua was shielding the